Happy Halloween and October round out

A few things happened this month that I should have written about in real time but was busy with the things.  Or being lazy.  

Firstly, the weather finally became more bearable. In fact, early last week, I was able to turn off the AC.  Now it's cold in the mornings and warm in the afternoons and early evenings and chilly overnight.  I did put the heat on low a couple days ago but was able to turn it off again as it is oscillating back to warmer temperatures.

Secondly, a few Mondays back, I alluded to "some other news to share this week."  I am was employed again!  Alas, it didn't last and while I wrote up a draft about the adventure before my contract ended, I'm gonna whittle it done to the essentials.

And lastly, a couple of weeks ago we were in St Louis for Fall Break.  Fall Break down here occurs the week before Columbus/Indigenous Persons Day.  We left on Wednesday around 1 pm and got to the hotel just around 5:30 pm with one bathroom break.  We brought along our pseudo-3rd child, and the kids rotated sleeping on an air mattress.  Actually, Natasha found that it was so comfortable that she ended up sleeping on it most of the trip.

We visited the City Museum on Thursday and spent most of the day there.  City Museum is a great place to burn kids energy but you have to have a system because you will get separated from them.  Oh and the food is high-priced and terrible.  Best to pack a cooler and tailgate in the parking lot.

On Friday we did apple picking along with seeing the Arch, which was closed because of the government shutdown.  On Saturday we did Grant's Farm.  Every night was spent back at the hotel for pool time.  I was also able to met with Jewel on Saturday for dinner.  

Stray observations.  I'm glad I didn't cancel my participation in this trip for what turned out to be 8 days of employment with nothing to do (story to come later).  If I could do this over, I would have met Jewel for dinner earlier in the trip.  We had good food at the restaurant she found and the leftovers would have made good lunches.  Instead, we ended up dumping them because we were leaving and didn't have good options to keep them cold.

I think we did a lot and had fun but we overloaded the kids' batteries.  While kids are resilient, they didn't have enough time to recover from Day One to fully enjoy Day Two and then Day Three.

Grants Farm is a fine place to visit, especially in October when it is decorated for Halloween.  But be warned:  While admission is free, everything there is to do comes at a cost, some outrageously high.  I will say the food at the Bauernhof Courtyard is decent proportions at reasonable post-pandemic prices.  

3rd Child was also starting to get on my nerves.  She is better behaved than my douche nuggets, but her "grandparents" spoil her, and it was bleeding over into our trip.  Case in point, we ordered lunch, which came with a side.  She said she didn't want a side, so I said "Since it comes with one, order something and someone else can eat it".  She was about to order a side no one wanted, but I put an end to that.

All in all, it was a lovely trip but if we do it again we have to do things in a different order and allow more recovery time.